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Wednesday, June 26, 2013

AMK's adverb avoidance

Way back in the Disco years, when I was a law clerk, there was an ongoing joke going around that Justice Kennedy really didn't like adverbs of the "-ly" variety, that he would go to some lengths to avoid using them, and that his clerks sometimes have fun trying to sneak them past him. So, I had to smile at this line from his Perry dissent -- "Those errors necessitate this respectful dissent" -- and this one: "These are the premises for this respectful dissent." (Ed.: That's the best you can do for commentary on today's cases? Lame.)